


I couldn't stay astray

by ConvenientAlias



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Cat/Human Hybrids, Catboys & Catgirls, Gen, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-06 09:33:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20289280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ConvenientAlias/pseuds/ConvenientAlias
Summary: Neil is a catboy. It doesn't particularly make his life easier.





	I couldn't stay astray

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flowersforgraves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flowersforgraves/gifts).

It was hard to travel incognito when you were a catboy. There just weren’t that many catboys in the world, far less in America, far less with orange and black patterning that was as characteristically Wesninski as a knife. Neil had to dye his hair, obviously, and the fur on his ears, which was harder—hair dye in general was made for human hair, not sleek cat fur. But he managed. Somehow he managed. When he could, when he was only staying somewhere briefly, he wore hats all the time. When that failed him, all he could do was hope his lies were opaque enough. His ears and tail betrayed him and his mom often enough, and he wondered sometimes whether it was his appearance that gave them away that last time, too… but it wasn’t something that bore thinking about, so mostly he didn’t think about it.

Honestly, he was shocked when Kevin didn’t recognize him. Okay, it had been years since they saw each other last, but really? He knew his face looks a lot like his father’s, and the fact that he was a catboy should already have made Kevin at least be thinking about it. But no. Kevin didn’t recognize him at all, except as a decent Exy player—“which is especially impressive in a catboy,” he noted, “so don’t worry we’ll count that against you.”

Comments like that made Neil’s fur stand on end. With indignation, not fear. There was nothing about Kevin that scared Neil. Well, not like that.

Coach Wymack said something a bit less condescending, though it still put Neil on edge. “Think you’d be the first catboy to be a professional Exy player. Usually catboys don’t go for it—you guys tend to be so short and thin, after all. Makes it tricky.”

“I doubt I’ll go pro,” Neil said curtly.

“Not if you don’t work for it,” Wymack said. “But you’re on my team. You better work for it. Can’t just laze around in the sun all day.”

Neil refrained from commenting. Wymack had missed the point, as usual. He was also wrong about Neil; Neil wasn’t the type of cat to laze around in the sun. Even when he did curl up, he did it in secluded corners—sometimes he found himself instinctively crawling under beds and couches when he was feeling tired or overwhelmed, which wasn’t the best habit either but at least left him out of sight.

* * *

Neil’s father was the kind of catboy you didn’t really call a catboy. More of a tiger, and more of a man. His ears were rounded, and they and his hair and his tail had crisp orange and black striping just like Neil’s. He would have looked ridiculous if he hadn’t been so menacing. He had claws, too, and although he favored knives when he tortured and killed, sometimes he’d briefly use the claws just to get a more personal touch.

Neil’s mother, on the other hand, was merely human. Nathan’s father was contemptuous of this fact. He said it was why he was a tiger but Neil had come out as little more than a striped housecat.

“Oh well,” he’d say whenever he was in a philosophical mood (which was seldom), “you’ll learn to scratch and bite, anyhow. Law of the jungle, little kitten. Kill or be killed, eat or be eaten. You’ll learn.”

Neil never felt like he was made for the jungle, but his home was one regardless, and he learned to survive. Still, he was definitely better at being a stray cat than a tiger. It was hard to live in a jungle; much easier to survive on the streets.

* * *

Neil might have been scrawny, but he was vicious on the Exy field. Commentators on his first match talked about his catlike reflexes, said his balance was helped by his tail. Some referred to the rumor that catboys were disproportionately strong for their size, too—inaccurate, Neil was hardly stronger than anyone else, he just trained hard and had a bad temper.

He could be vicious off the field too. In practices he hissed whenever Seth Gordon got too close to him, and batted away any hands that tried to touch him. Eventually he allowed Matt Boyd near him, but even then, no touching. And even that concession had a price, which was that from then on, he’d get hissy when people got too close to Matt too.

(It was his territorial side—usually he didn’t get to know people enough to activate it, but in this case, unfortunately, he’d stayed long enough for it to come into play.)

He hissed when Renee came over to talk. He hissed when Dan kissed Matt, and would silently stare at them until Dan went away. He once scratched Nicky when Nicky slapped Matt on the back, which made him actually feel a little guilty. He didn’t mind scratching when it was warranted, but scratching someone who probably didn’t deserve it made him feel too much like Nathan.

At last Andrew put an end to it. He barged into the locker room and pinned Matt against the wall. When Matt protested, he said, “Nothing personal, Boyd. Just a second.”

He glanced at Neil. “Heel, kittie.”

“That’s something you say to dogs,” Neil said sullenly.

“Oh, sorry to offend your feline dignity. What am I supposed to do, click my tongue at you? Maybe I should offer you a treat?”

“Those are also things you do for dogs, dumbass. And get off Matt. He didn’t do anything.”

“No, he didn’t. But you did.” Andrew did release Matt, crowding into Neil’s space instead. “You scratched Nicky. You drew blood. Did you think that was something I’d allow? You touching my people?”

“He touched my people,” Neil protested.

“Matt isn’t your person, he’s just the guy who lives in your room who you’ve imprinted on because you think with your animal brain instead of your human brain,” Andrew said dismissively. “Now start thinking a little harder and a little better, pet, or I’ll take up drowning kittens as a hobby. Capiche?”

Andrew wasn’t really a cat person.

* * *

Riko Moriyama, on the other hand, liked cats a lot.

He told Neil as much at the first banquet they attended together. Said he’d always hoped they would find Nathaniel Wesninski eventually because he’d always wanted a pet cat. “You’re a very mediocre Exy player,” he said disdainfully. “Almost sub-par. But I’ll let it go, because you’re completely adorable. Maybe I’ll keep you at Edgar Allan as a mascot instead of a player.”

“I’m not going to be your pet cat,” Neil told him, “and I’m not going to Edgar Allan. You can drop your delusions.”

But over Christmas break, that was just where he ended up.

For all his talk, Riko did want Neil as an Exy player. He trained him as hard as any of the others, and possibly harder—Neil’s head was so far gone that he could barely keep track of what was going on, so he wasn’t really sure. He also really did want Neil as a pet. He put a collar around Neil’s neck with the number four on the tag, a collar which locked on so that Neil couldn’t take it off when Riko wasn’t watching. He wore it for practice, even though it made it hard to breathe. He wore it when he ate, and felt the leather rub against his neck when he swallowed. He wore it in the shower even though the water wasn’t good for the leather because Riko wouldn’t fucking take it off.

At night, Riko attached a leash to the collar and attached the leash to the end of his own bed. He made Neil curl up at the bottom of the bed, though he was generous enough to give Neil a blanket, at least. In the morning, he would kick Neil awake and drag him out of bed by the scruff of his neck, but at night he would sometimes sit up in bed and pet Neil’s head over and over again. The annoying thing was that he was really good at scratching Neil’s ears. Neil hadn’t let anyone scratch behind his ears in ages.

It was a nice sensation, in the worst way. But he’d do it in public too, in front of the rest of the team, making everyone snicker. “Good kittie,” he’d purr. “You might be shit at passes but at least you have nice fur. Your daddy should have named you Stripes.”

He didn’t realize until he’d gotten back home—that is to say, until he’d gotten back to Palmetto—that Riko had stripped the brown dye out of his hair, leaving it aggressively tiger-patterned. Beautiful, Riko had said. Fierce, his father had once said.

When Neil saw it, he was almost sick.

* * *

Coach Wymack said, “We’ll have to have a locksmith look at that collar.”

Neil cupped the tag with one hand, rubbing over and over again the number four engraved upon it. Then he got a strip of packing tape and taped over it. He didn’t want the team to see. Not yet.

When they got back, they could tell he was hurt, and they were disproportionately concerned about the collar. He told them that he had been at Edgar Allan and the collar was a gift from Riko. Simple enough.

Renee offered to pick the lock. He said no thank you. Riko would be mad if he did that. Riko would be very mad.

Matt tried to pet him for the first time in months, since he learned Neil didn’t like to be touched. Neil jerked away. Then he wished he hadn’t. He’d let Riko pet him, hadn’t he? Against his will, but he’d let him. Yet he’d never let a friend do the same. Still, he couldn’t exactly ask Matt to try again. And when he thought about being scratched behind the ears again, how nice it might be, it only made him shudder. He’d let Riko make him frail and broken and soft all at the same time, and none of those were conditions that would help him. He had to be the hardened stray again, the alley tom. He had to get his fucking act together.

Then he met Andrew on the rooftop.

Andrew started by punching him. “Don’t fight my battles,” he hissed. “You don’t have to let yourself get beaten up to protect me! What the fuck do you think you are, a fucking watchdog? I thought you were too proud for that kind of thing!”

But then, before Neil left, he seemed to regret hitting Neil, and asked permission to pet him. Not exactly as an apology, but as perhaps the closest thing to an apology a Minyard could do. He asked, so Neil allowed him, and he stood very still.

He wasn’t very good at petting, and his fingers dug in a little too much, but maybe that was good. His hands were nothing like Riko’s.

Days later Neil stood still for him again when he took out one of his knives and, lifting up the leather of Neil’s collar, carefully cut it away. Then he dragged Neil outside, where he burned it. The smell of burning leather summoned quite a few students to complain, but when they saw it was Andrew, they backed off. All except Nicky and Aaron and Renee, who looked at the scene quizzically, but didn’t ask any questions.

Andrew’s explanation to Neil was simple, pretty much what Neil would have expected. “You don’t belong to Riko,” he said. “You’re not a fucking belonging. You’re not a pet.”

“I knew that,” Neil said, vaguely offended.

(But part of him didn’t know it.

Part of him, free of the collar, felt oddly more domesticated than ever.

Only he didn’t belong to Riko, of course. He belonged to Andrew, and to the Foxes. Because, although he'd never admit it, for all his years of straying, he had often wanted a home. And here he had at last found one.)

**Author's Note:**

> Did you know making someone a catperson is a great excuse to just write 2000 words of plotless angst? Well, now you know!


End file.
